Worst Supervisor or manager you've ever had...

I thought this would be fun considering the fact that Brown Cafe consists of mostly union members. If your in management you can list the worst employee you've ever had. I've had both horrible supervisors in the past, and horrible employees as well. I think we could all learn a little bit from a discussion such as this. Its a two way street as Hoaxster said in a previous post comparing management to hourlies. Neither union or management is better than the other. It all comes down to the type of person you are dealing with (in my opinion anyways). So go ahead and rant about some of your worst experiences at UPS. We could all learn from others mistakes

Let me note one thing first, the current center management team in our building is the best we've had in decades. That said, we've had really baaad ones, too. But the top of the list is the guy who only lasted 9 months as a center manager before being transferred and kicked back down to on road. He came in with a chip on his shoulder, and never made a single friend in labor or management. Even his own guys were waiting around the corner, poised with a knife. Anyway, my favorite thing he did to me was that he was mad that I'd used a couple 8 hour requests one week, and when the third one hit, he denied it. The reason was that the couldn't read my signature on the request. He wrote across the front of the request, "cannot read handwriting" and then he went and placed it in my mailbox. Hmmmm... So long, Jack, we miss you.

We had one nutcase center manager that insisted on being in the dressing room with the guys when they changed into their uniforms in the morning. Even suttle little hints like " get the f out of here or what are you- a f-----?" fell upon deaf ears. He finally got fired for falsifing a part timers time card- or so we were told. He ended up resurfacing as a center manager at another center and as far as I know might still be there.

I was on light duty in the middle of winter and worked nights on the car wash. Full time supervisor refused to put the heat on in the building. Like it was coming out of his pocket. He was also one of those sneaky guys constantly spying on everyone.

Welp, he quit to go work for DHL before they crapped the bed. Would be a shame if he was one of the people to fall victim to their subsequent downsizing .

I think the biggest issue I have ever faced with an employee is insubordination. Me and the employee were really not what you would call friends when we were both hourlies. We were even hired at the same time. Never did get along. Then all of the sudden I was his boss. He would pretend not to hear my instructions until I had a very firm discussion with him on "working as instructed".

UPSer21, if you want to gain more respect of your employees, you will try to find some other reasons for them follow your instructions than "work as directed". Those words demonstrate such a lack of intelligence or a lack of communication skills, or both. Free advice: if that's the best reason you can think of for an employee to do as you instruct, you should hold your tongue, it will make you look smarter to the employees.

Thanks for the feedback dusty. I appreciate it honestly. All of my employees do respect me, and have told me so from time to time. I help them where I can and I never yell. I train an employee if he or she is having trouble. However that particular employee was giving me a cold shoulder and was letting the team down. I felt I had to be firm in that situation. Sometimes a dog has to bark. Even if he doesn't bite

21, your ability to manage effectively isn't measured by how well you deal with the employees who are never a problem. It's a much bigger challenge to deal with the "troublemakers" in a responsible, professional manner. In my 30 years, I've seen a variety of managers, some of whom are much better at people management than others. Losing the respect of your employees is a kiss of death for a manager. I don't have to do you any favors, and believe me, you will need favors from me long before I need a favor from you. I can make a manager look really good or really bad. How you behave really sets the tone of how well I will perform for you. If I see you treating others with a lack of respect, you will earn no respect from me. And, without my respect, you will be unable to manage effectively.

I'm pleased that you at least recognize the importance of good management skills. They are only tested in difficult circumstances. It's like that quote, "Anyone can hold the helm when the seas are calm."

I've had my fair share of troubled employees, most of which were just angry because the world didn't revolve around them.

Probably the worst employee I have ever had was terminated about a month ago after I caught him stealing.

He was the type of employee that always seemed to have a chip on his shoulder. He was OK when he was first hired, although he always had a defiant attitude and seemed to think he was above having to do part-time work. Then he got injured. He claimed (and I say claimed because no one witnessed this happen) that he permanently injured his knee when a package hit the back of his leg while he was working a pick-off position. Multiple doctors said nothing was wrong with his knee, and the doctors who thought it could have been injured said it couldn't have happened the way he described. Either way his insurance claim was denied and when he came back to work he claimed that UPS management was the reason his insurance claim was denied (we have nothing to do with it).

When he came back his attitude was the worst I have ever dealt with. He was working a pull and park position and he would walk as slow as possible and drive only as fast as the truck would idle everywhere claiming he was working "as fast as he felt safe". Obviously we couldn't do anything about it because you cannot discipline on performance. We suspected him of stealing, but could never prove it. There was even a case where a package containing 50lbs of marijuana went missing from the center manager's office (it was being held for DEA seizure). When we finally located the package it was sitting under a trailer in the yard and we witnessed him drive his personal vehicle up to the trailer, got out and looked around, saw us watching him, got back into his truck, and left. When security pulled him in for an interview he of course denied everything.

A few weeks later a p/t sup found a brand new golf club hidden in the shadows beside the building. We decided to leave it there and stake it out to see who came back to pick it up. Sure enough, at midnight (about 2 hours after the shift ended and everyone had gone home) seconds after the last feeder driver left the yard, this employee pulls up and grabs the golf club. Myself and another sup come out of the building after watching him grab the club and confronted him. The look on his face, knowing we had just caught him red handed doing what he had so adamantly denied, was worth all the grief he had caused us for the previous few months.

I've had my fair share of troubled employees, most of which were just angry because the world didn't revolve around them.

Probably the worst employee I have ever had was terminated about a month ago after I caught him stealing.

He was the type of employee that always seemed to have a chip on his shoulder. He was OK when he was first hired, although he always had a defiant attitude and seemed to think he was above having to do part-time work. Then he got injured. He claimed (and I say claimed because no one witnessed this happen) that he permanently injured his knee when a package hit the back of his leg while he was working a pick-off position. Multiple doctors said nothing was wrong with his knee, and the doctors who thought it could have been injured said it couldn't have happened the way he described. Either way his insurance claim was denied and when he came back to work he claimed that UPS management was the reason his insurance claim was denied (we have nothing to do with it).

When he came back his attitude was the worst I have ever dealt with. He was working a pull and park position and he would walk as slow as possible and drive only as fast as the truck would idle everywhere claiming he was working "as fast as he felt safe". Obviously we couldn't do anything about it because you cannot discipline on performance. We suspected him of stealing, but could never prove it. There was even a case where a package containing 50lbs of marijuana went missing from the center manager's office (it was being held for DEA seizure). When we finally located the package it was sitting under a trailer in the yard and we witnessed him drive his personal vehicle up to the trailer, got out and looked around, saw us watching him, got back into his truck, and left. When security pulled him in for an interview he of course denied everything.

A few weeks later a p/t sup found a brand new golf club hidden in the shadows beside the building. We decided to leave it there and stake it out to see who came back to pick it up. Sure enough, at midnight (about 2 hours after the shift ended and everyone had gone home) seconds after the last feeder driver left the yard, this employee pulls up and grabs the golf club. Myself and another sup come out of the building after watching him grab the club and confronted him. The look on his face, knowing we had just caught him red handed doing what he had so adamantly denied, was worth all the grief he had caused us for the previous few months.

When I was first hired, my sup was a real dud. I didn't even like him personally and there is very few people I can say that about.

Anyways, he is training me and we both don't know the city very well. I am driving and he is STANDING in the back of the package car with the bulk head door open. He is plotting address on the map and sorting while navigating me.

Of course he is saying I should never do this, and I'm thinking what am I getting myself into! I can remember him completing commit time air packages in the back of the car so they wouldn't be late and arguing with customers big time.

It got so bad that the district manager got him on the phone with our workgroup on a conference call so that he could apologize to us all for his behaviour. Talk about belittling a person in front of his employees. (Not that he didn't deserve it).

Anyways, that was the last time I heard from him as he was fired after the phone call.

My worst sup ever was a center manager named Barry.If you are reading this Barry,I still hate you and would probobly go out of my way to ruin your day if we ever cross paths again
He was a young guy that loved playing god.
After I got my job back when he fired me,one morning he says,
good morning bud...
I will not be at his funeral when he disregards the safe boating message.

I had the same feeder leader all 4 years I was a seasonal feeder driver. Because I was already very experienced our "check rides" consisted of me driving him to every local center we could hit in a day so he could go in and brown-nose. I'd sometimes sit out in the tractor for 2 hours while he was in pitching himself to the higher-ups.

I wasn't really sure what he was doing until another feeder manager drove up next to me one day with his trainee and asked me how long I'd been sitting there in the yard. When I mentioned who my manager was he immediately knew what was going on and filled me in. He said that all of the other management detested this guy and that they were all hoping that his salesmanship would get him relocated so they wouldn't have to deal with him anymore.